THE ARTIST'S CREED 327 



culate, shapes itself in words: "I see something — 

 come and look at it!" From this invitation to come 

 and look at something seen we rise to the desire of 

 exhibiting — conveying a feeling to others, and in 

 the long result we have art in a multiplicity of 

 forms, each giving a partial, never a fuU, satisfaction. 

 And it never can, seeing that it is not an end in 

 itself but a means to an end, an everlasting aspira- 

 tion and striving after something unattainable or 

 not yet attained. 



This has doubtless been often said, but it does not 

 fit into the artist's creed. What is his creed — what 

 is the meaning of art to him ? I take it that for him 

 there is nothing conceivable beyond art as a means 

 of self-expression, that the utmost he can do is 

 to strive to emulate just what others have been 

 doing for thousands of years — that, in fact, art is 

 an end in itself. 



Here I recall the statement of a great painter, a 

 leading post-impressionist, I think he is called, who 

 flourished towards the end of the last century, as 

 given in his Life and Letters. He affirmed his belief 

 in immortality, and said that he looked forward to 

 a happy eternity in following his art of landscape- 

 painting in other spheres, since no greater happiness, 

 no higher destiny could be conceived by him. 



It is an extreme statement of the feeling of the 

 artist, who is an enthusiast and absorbed in his 

 art; but artists, as a rule, whether they believe in 

 immortality or not, do regard art as the highest 

 achievement of the human mind. 



